Wednesday nights are optimal for comedy. It's hump day, and we could all use a good laugh. For the last couple years, Mr. Head's Bar and Gallery and Kevin William Lee have hosted a spot for the local comedians to stretch their funny legs and try telling jokes in front of a live audience every week at 10:30 p.m. Unfortunately, Kevin was relieved of the position and has been handed down to Jacob Breckenridge and myself.

Recently, there was a bit of a skirmish between Lee and a traveling act that performed at the bar on Wednesday, May 21. To make a long story short, there was a discrepancy regarding payment and the format of the show. Jay Whitecotton, JT Habersaat and Joe Staats are on a southwest comedy tour, so they reached out to Lee to book a show in Tucson. They all met at a Super Bowl party at Doug Stanhope's house in Bisbee.

While I don't appreciate witch hunts or bullying, you can read Whitecotton's side of the story here and here and form your own opinion of the events that have transpired. I have been substitute host for two of Lee's open mics, and I have been paid for both times, so, I can honestly say I have been treated fairly. I think this whole situation could have been dealt with differently, but everyone makes mistakes.


Last night, there were 16 comedians and one homeless man that goes by the name Midnight. All the audience members referred to him as Jesus. Midnight sits behind the patio barrier and listens to the comedy show religiously, so it's charming and terrifying when he crosses the fence to tell some jokes. Doesn't happen often, so it's totally worth your attention.


Pauly Casillas took the stage, and he was upstaged by two Power Rangers. Casillas is a professional comedian, so he knows how to deal with hecklers. So, he made them a part of a show and challenged them to do some cartwheels and a dance off. You know, just basic Power ranger shit.


Overall, it was a fun night. The Tucson comedy scene is strong, always evolving and welcoming social circle. If you haven't tried it and want to cross out another bucket list item, we will be waiting for you.

Cinema La Placita, Tucson’s premier downtown outdoor film series, is playing one of my favorite films of a time time tonight—Howard Hawks’ classic madcap comedy His Girl Friday. Cinema La Placita has been playing Cary Grant films all month long, and this is definitely a high-point to go out on. If you’re into zany romantic moments, fast-talking shenanigans and cheeky situations, do yourself a favor and check this out. His Girl Friday starts at 7:30 p.m. and tickets are $3, and that includes a bag of golden popped corn. Stay tuned for next month’s events at Cinema La Placita—they’re doing Hitchcock in June. For more information, visit cinemalaplacita.com.

There’s only a few more days left in May, and there’s only two more Fellini screenings this month at the Loft Cinema. First up is the 1986 film Ginger & Fred, starring Marcello Mastroianni and Giulietta Massina as a pair of Italian Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire impersonators. This is one of the few Fellini films I haven’t seen, but I’m hoping to remedy that soon. You can see it sooner than me—it starts tonight at 7 p.m. Tickets are regular admission. On Saturday, May 31 at 7 p.m. is the 1960 classic La Dolce Vita, starring Fellini regular Marcello Mastroianni and the stunning Anita Ekberg. Mastroianni is Marcello Rubini, a reporter for a sleazy tabloid paper in Rome. This is the film that put Fellini on the map, and the one that coined that lazy go-to adjective for film critics everywhere, “Fellini-esque.” Tickets are regular admission. Next month’s film series at the Loft is salute to Baltimore’s favorite son and the mighty Pope of Trash—the one and only John Waters.

A little over ten years ago, one of the most controversial films of all time was released—the cult classic Battle Royale. It was much ballyhooed and all sorts of tall tales swirled around it’s infamy. It was rumored to be outright banned in the U.S. and as far as everyone knew (this was pre-Facebook, Twitter and even Myspace), only one theater in the country, UC Theater in Berkeley, was brave enough to play it, albeit for one night only. I bought a horribly dubbed copy on VHS at my first year at the San Diego Comic-Con for $50. So what’s the deal? Why so controversial? This debuted about a year after Columbine, that's why. The film takes place on a Japanese island, and ordinary school kids are forced to kill each other with a variety of weapons, both high-powered and makeshift. It takes it's cues from The Running Man, A Clockwork Orange, and of course, Lord of the Flies. The Hunger Games series is highly based on Battle Royale’s premise, although that series is the cinematic equivalent of a Handi Wipe. See what all the fuss is about on Friday, May 30 and Saturday, May 31. Both screenings are at 10 p.m. Tickets are $6 for general admission and $5 for Loft members. For more info, visit loftcinema.com.

New Scientist takes a look at the work of UA trauma doc Peter Rhee and his colleagues, who is exploring a new technique of saving lives by putting people in a form of suspended animation.

Rhee, who was one of the trauma docs on duty during the 2011 shooting rampage at Gabby Giffords' Congress on Your Corner, has been testing the concept since 2000:

The technique was first demonstrated in pigs in 2000 by Rhee and his colleagues. The animals were sedated and a massive haemorrhage induced, to mimic the effect of multiple gunshot wounds. Their blood was drained and replaced by either a cold potassium or saline solution, rapidly cooling the body to around 10 °C. After the injuries were treated, the animals were gradually warmed up as the solution was replaced with blood.
Vital signs

The pig's heart usually started beating again by itself, although some pigs needed a jump-start. There was no effect on physical or cognitive function.

"After we did those experiments, the definition of 'dead' changed," says Rhee. "Every day at work I declare people dead. They have no signs of life, no heartbeat, no brain activity. I sign a piece of paper knowing in my heart that they are not actually dead. I could, right then and there, suspend them. But I have to put them in a body bag. It's frustrating to know there's a solution."

New Scientist reports that the process will be tested in Pittsburgh:

Sad news in the local Mexican restaurant world, the Guadalajara Original Grill located at 1220 E. Prince Road will be closed indefinitely due to a small fire in its storage room on Thursday morning. The cause and origin of the fire are under investigation, according to the press release. Guadalajara Original Grill originally opened in 2002, and has won Best of Tucson's guacamole every year the award was mentioned since 2009. 


From Facebook:

We regret to inform you that our restaurant sustained a small fire this morning. We will be closed for an undetermined time. We are diligently working to restore the restaurant and will be reopening bigger and better than ever soon. More details to follow soon. Thank you, Tucson, for your patience and support.

Ann-Eve Pedersen looks at the theft of half a million dollars by an employee of the STO, Arizona School Choice Trust (ASCT), in a segment of our cable access program, Education: The Rest of the Story. "STO" is short for School Tuition Organization, an organization that uses tuition tax credits, aka backdoor vouchers, to pay for students' private school tuition.

What makes this theft of taxpayer money noteworthy is that ASCT is run by members of the Goldwater Institute, an organization whose six-figure-salaried spokespeople scream about waste and mismanagement in the public sector. Yet a half million dollars of taxpayers' money was stolen from under their noses over a number of years, and nobody noticed. Watchdog, watch thyself.

[Headline Correction: Lucy Caldwell, Communications Director for the Goldwater Institute, contacted me requesting that I correct some "factual inaccuracies" in this post. She noted that the Arizona School Choice Trust is not a "Goldwater Institute-Run STO" as I stated in the headline. She is correct. Clint Bolick, Vice President for Litigation at G.I., is the Chairman of the ASCT board, but he does that on his own time. I regret the error. Caldwell also said it was factually inaccurate for me to write that "ASCT is run by members of the Goldwater Institute." She maintains I should not have written "members," since Bolick is the only G.I.-affiliated board member. In this instance, I am going to stick with my original statement. Another current board member is Matthew Ladner. He was G.I.'s vice president of research, mainly dealing with educational issues, until he left to work at Jeb Bush's Foundation for Excellence in Education. However, Ladner is still listed as a Senior Fellow on the G.I. website, meaning he has not severed ties with the Institute. Also worth noting is that Darcy Olsen, President and CEO of the Goldwater Institute, served on the ASCT board from 2006 through 2009, which means three people who are part of G.I. have been board members of ASCT.]

[Odd Request For Further Correction: Lucy Caldwell emailed me again, writing that part of my correction above is incorrect. I mentioned that Matthew Ladner is listed as a Senior Fellow on the G.I. website, which is correct. However, according to Communications Director Caldwell, the information communicated on the website is incorrect.

Matt Ladner is not a senior fellow at the Institute. We disbanded our senior fellow program a long time ago. The fact that he has a bio that you can find on our site is a bug of our current site (which is under a major redesign) by which you cannot delete a person's bio without deleting everything they ever wrote/authored.

Matthew Ladner wrote an email confirming the dissolution of the Senior Fellow program.

I remember it distinctly as we were sent an thoughtful wall plaque thanking us for our service along with a letter explaining the dissolution of the program.

It's beyond me why it's taken the Goldwater Institute, with its multi-million dollar annual budget and its many six-figure salaried employees, this long to make a stab at fixing a portion of its website which has been wrong for quite awhile. Maybe they've all been too busy going after all those public sector folks who, they say, can never get anything right.]

Eponyms are names that have become immortalized in well known words, such as syphilis, sadism and masochism. We’ll get to those, but let’s start with a favorite, bogart, which is slang for hogging something, like a medical marijuana joint at a party, instead of passing it on. As movie buffs will guess, bogart comes from Humphrey Bogart, who had a cigarette continually dangling from his lips—just like the guy at the party. The term got a big boost from the 1969 flick Easy Rider, which featured the song “Don’t Bogart Me” by the pretty well-forgotten band “Fraternity of Man”, whose lyrics began with “Don’t bogart that joint, my friend, pass it over to me.”
Words for clothing are often eponyms. Bloomers are those puffy trouser-like things that women once wore under a skirt. They were promoted as enabling women to play sports and such that they couldn't in a dress. This fashion trend was picked up by suffragettes, one of whom was Mrs. Amelia Jenks Bloomer, and the undergarment became known as bloomers. Fortunately for women, fashion ultimately changed; women now can wear trousers that we call pants, so that today either sex might be wearing the pants in the family. Pants is a shortening of pantaloons, which comes from a stock goofball character in Italian comedies who wore this kind of clothing. This character, by the way, derives from St. Panteleone, the patron saint of Venice, which just goes to show you that nothing is sacred. Parenthetically, I should warn Americans that the Brits have a different understanding of the word pants, who use it as a synonym for panties. This will help you avoid a faux pas I once made. Better just say levi’s, named of course for Levi Strauss, who in turn was named after the Biblical father of one of the twelve tribes of Israel.

I have no good segue for this, so I’ll just move on to guillotine, which you will recall is a device popularized during the French Revolution, used to lop off the heads of people who failed to show sufficiently radical sympathies. Although the guillotine sounds gruesome, it was designed by Dr. Joseph Guillotine as a more humane method of execution than hanging, firing squads, and other more painful, slower methods of capital punishment. As Dr. Guillotine himself touted his invention to the French Assembly: “With my machine, I cut off your head in the twinkling of an eye, and you never feel it!” The necks of many members of the French Assembly, including Robespierre, would soon get to test the Doctor’s claim. The word derrick, which we now mostly think of as the structure in an oil derrick, began as a word for the tower supporting the hangman’s noose. It was named after one Thomas Derrick, a notorious English executioner, who was pardoned from the death penalty himself on the condition that he enter that particular profession. Proving that history loves irony, in 1601 Derrick was called upon to hang the Earl of Sussex, the man who pardoned him.

Speaking of Earls, the common sandwich is named after the infamous libertine, the Fourth Earl of Sandwich, who asked his servant to prepare him something that he could eat that wouldn’t pull him away from the gaming tables. Hence: a meal of meat and other food stuffed between two slices of bread. When he wasn’t gambling and fornicating, the Earl did stints as the First Lord of the Admiralty, where he sponsored Captain James Cook’s remarkable global voyages in the late 1700’s. A grateful Cook named the Sandwich Islands after him, but this honor was diminished when the islands were renamed Hawaii.

Masochism, in which a person achieves pleasure from being inflicted with pain, is from a 19th century Austrian writer, Leopold Von Sacher-Masoch, who among other things signed a contract with his mistress which called for her to treat him as his slave for six months. A contract? Really? His best known novel is Venus in Furs, which recently was made into a Tony Award-nominated broadway play, as well as a French movie. Sadism is from the Marquis de Sade, who achieved fame with his well known sex-capades, which in opposition to masochism involved inflicting pain on others. Interestingly, Citizen de Sade’s sexual proclivities did not prevent him from being elected as a delegate to the National Convention during the French Revolution. Syphilis derives from a 16th century Italian poem entitled “Syphilis Sive de Morbo Gallico”, which translates to “Syphilis, or the French Disease”, in which the hero, a shepherd named Syphilis, becomes the disease’s first victim.

Most of us would probably like to have a word coined after them, but John Duns Scotus would be humiliated that a dull-minded person is called a dunce. Dr. Scotus was a famous 13th century theologian, whose works were later criticized as hair-splitting sophistry—and whose obstinate followers were mocked as dunces.

One of my favorite eponyms is bowdlerize, a term of ridicule for censoring a literary work by cutting offending passages. Bowdlerize is from Thomas Bowdler, who expended a great deal of effort purifying Shakespeare. For example, where Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth cried "Out, damned spot!", Bowdler changed it to "Out, crimson spot!" He also attempted to improve the Word of God by eliminating some of the Bible's racier passages. I hope my editor sees no need to bowdlerize this column.

Richard Martinez, father of a University of California Santa Barbara student killed in the recent mass shooting that took six lives, is taking on the gun lobby. How far will this latest challenge go?

From talkingpointsmemo.com:

"Have we learned nothing? These things are going to continue until somebody does something," Richard Martinez said in an interview with CNN. "So where the hell is the leadership? Where the hell are these people we elect to congress that we spend so much money on? These people are getting rich sitting in Congress, and what do they do? They don't take care of our kids. My kid died because nobody responded to what happened at Sandy Hook."

Martinez's son, Christopher, was the last of six victims allegedly killed by Elliot Rodger before the suspected shooter took his own life. An emotional Martinez had railed against "craven, irresponsible politicians" and the National Rifle Association for their support of gun rights at a Saturday press conference. He redoubled his criticism of Congress in his interview with CNN, calling lawmakers a "rudderless bunch of idiots."

A visibly angry Martinez expressed dismay that no legislative action has been taken since 20 elementary school students were killed by shooter Adam Lanza in Newtown.

"Those parents lost little kids. I had 20 years with my son. That's all I'll ever have," he said. "But those people lost their children at 6 and 7 years old. How do you think they feel? And who's talking to them now, who's doing anything for them now? Who is standing up for those kids that died back then in an elementary school? Why wasn't something done? It's outrageous."

Calexico has been posting photos from Mexico, and it looks like they're back in the Old Pueblo to start recording their follow-up to Algiers.

Here's a photo from their Facebook page:

The world hasn't been the same since Reading Rainbow was cancelled. The critically acclaimed children's television series last aired in 2006, but was revitalized as an educational interactive book reading and video field trip app for the Kindle and iPad. That might change.

Levar Burton and his Reading Rainbow team need your help to bring the series back  using Kickstarter. Burton needs to raise $1 million dollars to bring the show back for children and teachers to use at no charge. Burton plans on making the program web based so it can be implemented in over 1500 classrooms at no cost to the schools.


The rewards are pretty unbelievable to say the least. Have you ever wanted to have dinner with Geordi La Forge while wearing his sweet shades? You can make it happen, and then some. Incentives include signed posters, headshots, thank you letters, customized voice message greetings and exclusive comic-con interactions. $350 Twitter follow from Levar Burton has to be the best reward.

Burton has 34 days to raise $1 million dollars, and we are running out of time:


Click here to help save the children. Think of the children, Rangers.

UPDATE:

I can't believe it, but they did it. 22,729 people raised $1,000,212 in less than 11 hours. Here's Levar touching reaction to the the news.

Tyler Flowers accidently lost his bat during Monday's game against Cleveland Indians. Fortunately for Flowers, White Sox fan reached for the bat as it bounced off the dugout and zeroed in for someone's baby. If she doesn't get recruited by the team and a movie starring Christopher Lloyd based on this event then I I'm not sure if I want to live in this world anymore.